Archive for August 2, 2012

Updated 4:11 p.m. ET

(CBS/AP) LITCHFIELD, Ill. – A double-decker Megabus has crashed into a concrete bridge pillar along Interstate 55 in southern Illinois.

There were an unknown amount of number of injuries and no confirmed fatalities shortly after the Thursday afternoon wreck. Television footage from the scene shows numerous emergency vehicles surrounding the bus and crews on ladders reaching inside the smashed front end of the bus.

via Double-decker bus slams into Illinois bridge – CBS News.

By Mark Hosenball

Reuters WASHINGTON

President Barack Obama has signed a secret order authorizing U.S. support for rebels seeking to depose Syrian President Bashar al-Assad and his government, U.S. sources familiar with the matter said.

Obama’s order, approved earlier this year and known as an intelligence “finding,” broadly permits the CIA and other U.S. agencies to provide support that could help the rebels oust Assad.

This and other developments signal a shift toward growing, albeit still circumscribed, support for Assad’s armed opponents – a shift that intensified following last month’s failure of the U.N. Security Council to agree on tougher sanctions against the Damascus government.

The White House is for now apparently stopping short of giving the rebels lethal weapons, even as some U.S. allies do just that.

via President Obama authorizes secret U.S. support for Syrian rebels.